Internal anatomy of octopuses

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Jan 18, 2008
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I'm duplicating the following post from my journal in this forum where it might be more visible (and maybe of future use) in hopes that one of our resident experts or someone with ceph dissection experience can provide insight.

gholland;123790 said:
I've attached a very short video clip to give a spacial perspective of the organs. Can somebody please confirm the identification of the different organs labeled in the frame grab?
1. Ink sac?
2. Two ctenidium (gills)?
3. Two... ovaries? gonads? They look too far removed from the gills to be branchial hearts...

What I'm really curious about is whether these near IR views might provide insight about the sex of the little critters.
Thanks,
Greg
 

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I think that you have labeled the ink sac correctly. I think that item 2 are the ovaries or testes and item 3 are the branchial hearts. Branchial hearts are at the base of the gills, so this would be the correct position for them.

I am much more familiar with squid (and cuttlefish) anatomy than octopus, so I could be wrong...
 

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Thank you both for clearing that up. The confusion came from diagrams like the one cuttlegirl posted that always seem to show the reproductive organs positioned above the branchial hearts.

Next question... I take it from Taollan's response that this particular octo is definitely male? It hasn't shown signs of enlarged suckers and I can't make a visual confirmation of a hectocotylus, but its behavior seems consistent with dwhatley's experience (very active and interactive). What should ovaries look like compared to the elongated light-colored structures on this one (assuming these are truly gonads)?
 

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